Posts tagged as:

Africa Reading Challenge

ARC Review #4 – Aya of Yop City, Abouet

28 December 2008

 

 Country: Côte d’Ivoire, West Africa
Author: Marguerite Abouet (& Clement Oubrerie)
Review: This is the continuation of the story started in Aya, about the three friends from Youpougon, the working-class neighbourhood of Côte d’Ivoire of the 1970s, three fairly ordinary young women in a working class neighbourhood (Youpougon, in Abidjan), and their teenage lives. The first book ends with the [...]

Read the full article →

ARC Review #3 – Aya, Abouet

11 September 2008

Country: Ivory Coast Côte d’Ivoire, West Africa
Author: Marguerite Abouet (& Clement Oubrerie)
Review: Yes, yes, another coming of age novel. But I had to think about this one, because (a) it’s not All About Me, and (b) it’s a graphic novel. It’s about three young women in the Ivory Coast [...]

7 comments Read the full article →

ARC Review #2 – Purple Hibiscus, Adichie

7 September 2008

Country:  Nigeria, West Africa
Author:  Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 
Review:  Perhaps it’s typical of novels from the African and Caribbean diaspora, but I find often that authors’ first novels are coming-of-age stories.   (It’s one of the things that’s turned me off reading novels from my own region, and equally, what’s stopped me writing The Big One.)  But that’s [...]

4 comments Read the full article →

Update on Africa Reading Challenge

7 September 2008

No, I haven’t forgotten it.  Have you?
Here’s my update.  I took books, as I said, to Guyana to read.  That was optimistic; I didn’t get the chance while on the ground, though I did read small bits of Purple Hibiscus in the bath once or twice.  I also didn’t get the chance to attend Karen [...]

1 comment Read the full article →

African Reading Challenge 2

18 August 2008

So I’ve taken the books I hope to finish with me to Guyana.
The one I’m reading now is Adichie’s Purple Hibiscus. In short, I’m enjoying it so far. I cheated and skimmed forward — I do that sometimes — but now I have to read on, savour it.
Watch this space — I plan [...]

1 comment Read the full article →

ARC Review #1 – Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits, (Lalami)

4 August 2008

Country:  Morocco, North Africa
Author:  Laila Lalami
Review:  This is a novel/collection of related short stories, and in this way reminds me of Naipaul’s Miguel Street. The stories are about four Moroccans who take the risk of crossing the narrow straits between Morocco and Spain, and are separated into two main sections: “Before” and “After”. [...]

Read the full article →

My Africa Reading List

26 July 2008

If I take part, that is.
What’s under my belt is pretty male and middle-century, and so I thought I’d branch out with some female voices and writing from more recent times

Adichie (Nigeria) - Purple Hibiscus, Half of a Yellow Sun
Emecheta (Nigeria) – The Joys of Motherhood
Ngugi (Kenya) – Wizard of the Crow
Baingana (Uganda) – Tropical Fish: Tales [...]

1 comment Read the full article →